Donalyn Miller is a 6th grade language arts teacher in Texas who is said to have a "gift": She can turn even the most reluctant (or, in her words, "dormant") readers into students who can't put their books down.
Donalyn is the author of The Book Whisperer: Awakening the Inner Reader in Every Child (Jossey-Bass/Education Week Press). She first appeared in teachermagazine.org in the popular"Creating Readers" Ask The Mentor column. She writes about how to inspire and motivate student readers, and responds to issues facing teachers and other leaders in the literacy field.

First Do No Harm

Primum non nocere- “First do no harm.” This tenet of the medical profession reminds doctors to consider the negative consequences of any medical intervention alongside the advantages. Quality of life for the patient overrides all other benefits of a course of treatment. I believe that the teaching profession needs this lesson as much as doctors do.

Little children love to read, or at least be read to. Even the most dormant readers in my classes can remember a book they have loved, even if it was Green Eggs and Ham. How sad that they have to reach back to their preschool memories to recall a book which they enjoyed. After years of schooling, book love goes away for many kids. Those of us who are charged with teaching students to read claim not to understand why love for reading and books goes away, but I secretly (OK, not so secretly, now) suspect that we do know. The manner in which schools institutionalize reading takes this love away from children.

What does reading look like for you? For me, reading is not just something I do; being a reader is something I am. In many ways, being a reader has defined my life. I married a reader, hang out with other readers in book clubs and grad classes, and have dedicated my professional life to working with children as a reading teacher. I want my students to see reading the way that I do.

Not only am I a passionate reader, I am a great test taker, too. I can dissect tests on topics which I do not know that much about in large part because I am a great reader. Let me repeat, I am a good test-taker because I am a good reader; I am not a good reader because I am a good test-taker.

Standardized reading test season has descended on classrooms, and the reading instruction in many of these rooms has narrowed to a handful of test-taking tricks drilled into students day in and day out in an endless, monotonous stream of acronyms, chants, and strategies. Make no mistake about it, no matter what we proclaim to our students about book love the rest of the year, this is the message they get from school about what reading is. The focus on test-taking "drill and kill" slowly strangles the joy of reading out of students, and narrows their possibilities as readers forever more.

Is there any teacher in the world who truly, with all of their hearts, believes that they are creating resilient, capable readers with all of this drill? The ugly truth is we know we aren’t, but we are doing what many administrators, parents, and legislators expect from us- get students to pass the test, the test, the test. If our students don’t ever pick up a book again after graduation, it is not our fault.

What we fail to confront in our hearts is the reality that those students who grew to love reading in spite of us still do better on those tests than all of the kids who endured years of reading instruction by highlighter, but never really read. Readers real-I-cannot-wait-to-get-my- hands-on-a-book-readers outstrip their peers on every test, every time.

Isn’t this what students should learn from us about reading?

It is an ethical issue, not just an instructional one. Children, who once sat on a lap and fell in love with a book, trust us and deserve more.

First, do no harm. Do not take away that love of reading for the sake of a test score. There is a reason it's called "drill and kill." It kills children’s love of reading for all of their lives.

Thanks for the blogs. I could not stop reading them because I too have a love of reading and want my students to develop a love it. I am teaching in the middle-school and want to teach an elective course in reading next year where students can read what they like to read and develop discussion around the books read. I will probably develop themes in the beginning and pick out books around the themes or even have them search for books in different genres on the theme.

Yes, yes, yes! Thank you so much for giving voice to what many of us are feeling. I remember loving to write in elementary and learning to hate it in middle and high school. I didn't pick the habit back up until college. It is sad how illustrating the importance of reading and writing has come at the expense of the passion some kids have for it.

Your articles have nourished so many teachers and have ignited their passion for teaching. Thank you for writing so passionately and for believing in connecting children and books, something to which I dedicated my whole career.
In these times of excess testing and narrowing of the curriculum, it is comforting to read your views and I thank you for promoting good reading strategies as well as great books.
Perhaps you may be interested in my new web site Enjoy and keep writing!

Your entries are a breath of fresh air for my soul! I am an avid reader who married a non-reader. But after 25 years of marriage he has become an avid reader as well -- we both read to our children from birth and although our first daughter was a special needs child, all of her teachers commented about her love of books and reading. Last year my spouse read over 75 books and has broadened his scope of authors he likes to read. Modeling before your family as well as your students is a great testimony. Keep writing!